Massive industrial disaster drill in Seria

A major joint disaster drill was held recently (28 June 2012, Thursday) at the Seria. The drill was held to improve coordination of emergency services in Belait as well as testing the district disaster management plan.

The drill which starts around 6:30am saw a scenario where  a self accident occurred in front of the Seria Crude Oil Terminal (SCOT) entrance. The car then collided with the nearby gas pipes and the spark from the engine caused the pipe to explode and killing the car driver and passenger.  The flames travelled into the nearby oil tanks at the SCOT causing major fire at the oil storage tanks. To make worse the impact of the explosion caused a crater at the road thus cutting road link from Anduki to the SCOT with only depending on the road link from Seria Town.

As the explosion occurred a group of workers working at the SCOT are also trapped by the fire with some of them are dead and injured. The Brunei Shell Fire and Emergency Services (BSPFAERS) from their fire station are activated and deploying all their fire engines and ambulances to the scene. The BSPFAERS then supported by their Brunei Fire and Rescue Department (BFRD) counterparts which respond from Seria, Kuala Belait and the SPARK fire stations. Paramedics from Suri Seri Begawan Hospital and Seria Medical Centre are also activated and rushed to the scene. To prevent curious onlookers and traffic from entering the disaster zone the police personnel from the Belait Police District Headquarters and Seria Police Station are deployed to cordoned the disaster zone. As a precaution and ensuring the safety of the residents at the nearby village and Seria Town a massive evacuation was also held after the disaster strikes.

The Brunei Shell Petroleum (BSP) along with other emergency services set up the Incident Command Post (ICP) and casualty triage and assessment point near the Seria STL yard which located few meters from the SCOT. As firefighters busy fighting the fire an explosion occurred once more at one of the tank causing three firefighter dead and several of the crews injured. It took the firefighters several hours to control and put down the fire and other firefighting teams are also deployed to other oil storage tanks for cooling down the tanks after it was affected by the heat from the fire. Another Hazardous Material (HAZMAT) team are also deployed to the disaster zone after the firefighters reported a chemical leak occurred at the incident site. As soon as disaster are under control the Search and Rescue team from the joint firefighting agency managed to rescue and evacuate all the workers trapped at the disaster site.

The four hours disaster drill ended around 10am and saw the participation of various agencies namely Brunei Shell Petroleum (BSP) as the lead agency, Brunei Fire and Rescue Department (BFRD), Royal Brunei Police Force (RBPF) and Ministry of Health.

The drill is not only to test the disaster plan and coordination of emergency services during emergency but it is also considering the SCOT as one of the high risk area in Brunei. It is also an initiative by BSP in order to create awareness and trained the workers and contractors on high risk safety and how to react if any emergency occurred at the facilities.